While the video-sharing app TikTok – subtitled “make your day” – shows short clips that users (read: mostly teenagers) can compose, distribute, and comment on, the online platform is increasingly used in politics – creating what might best be called “Politiktok”.
One of the key encouraging features for politicians is that they can distribute their short video messages themselves. In the world of online platforms, much of this is driven by an algorithm.
Perhaps the most important feature of Politiktok is that if a video triggers a lot of interactions, it will be seen by many people. In other words, the videos that appear to be the most successful are the most shocking, funny, outrageous, and sensational clips which attract the most attentions and cause the most reactions. It is purely about popularity – not sensibility.
To make it even easier, all one needs are two fingers to swipe from one short video to the next short video. It is a bit like zapping through TV programs from channel to channel. Yet, unlike TV, the range of TikTok videos seems endless.
Often euphemistically called “social media platform” (read: huge corporations), such online platforms are fast, shrill, vulgar, and loud. It is an eternal struggle for attention.
With attention-grabbing video clips, short memes, and brusque introductory statements, politicians are trying to inspire users on TikTok about politics. Some succeed and when they do, it converts TikTok into Politiktok.
Perhaps reviving the 1920s link between fascism and futurism, Germany’s neofascist political party – the AfD – has been the most successful when it comes to converting TikTok into Politiktok. Next in line is one of Germany’s most prominent politicians, Sahra Wagenknecht.
Wagenknecht is followed by progressive politician Heidi Reichinnek who is one of the most successful German politicians on Tiktok. One of her most clicked-on videos is a speech in which she makes fun of the neofascist AfD’s antiquated ideas on gender.
Reichinnek’s TikTok video has been played millions of times. For a long time, she was one of the very few who stood up against Germany’s far-right – the AfD – on TikTok.
At the same time, being on the German version of Tiktok means that one can hardly escape the AfD’s all-domineering presence on the online platform. Between influencers pushing traditional gender roles and baking cakes, and tips for your next trip to the gym, even the pretty face of German fascism – the AfD’s Alice Weidel – dancing in a car. Every bit of attention helps.
The Digital Quest for Attention
As an innovative and cunning political player, the right-wing extremist AfD has successfully appropriated the platform and, worse, it has spun a far-right network.
The AfD’s wide ranging Politiktok activities are supported by right-wing influencers and neo-Nazi devotees who instantaneously react to the AfD’s postings pushing the AfD’s far-right ideology further and further.
The AfD’s Polit TikTok videos are played out again and again. Right-wing politics combined with pop culture is designed to stimulate strong emotions pushing the AfD’s TikTok messages to ever more people. In this way, Germany’s far-right is addressing a younger generation – the classical users of TikTok.
The AfD’s inroads into young voters using Politiktok presents Germany’s democratic parties with a dilemma. Faced with the success of the AfD, they have been trying to resolve this in recent months. Rather than moving onto TikTok, they are sticking to the – justified – criticism of TikTok. The app is operated by China and is controlled by its provider Bytedance.
Germany’s democratic parties continue to leave the playing field to the far-right. Consequently, the AfD – more than Germany’s democratic parties – can reach young voters. So far, Germany’s democratic parties have refused to get involved in the game of digital attention-grabbing.
Meanwhile, progressive politicians like Reichinnek are convinced that every democratic party should have done more to reach young voters. They should not have left TikTok to the AfD. She argues that
people are quite capable of thinking critically and getting good and trustworthy information for themselves. But if people are flooded with the AfD’s rubbish from all over the place, they may not be questioning what is put in front of them.
The AfD’s Success with Politiktok
At least in parts, the AfD’s success with Poilitiktok is also because of the way the platform works. Like Facebook and Instagram, the rather opaque algorithms of Tiktok flushes videos upwards that it – through a mathematical equation or algorithm – considers popular.
With that, far-right messages can spread quickly even outside their own right-wing bubbles. This is extremely important for the AfD as it seeks to spread its far-right propaganda with messianic and missionary zeal.
On Tiktok, virtually any content that triggers its algorithms can reach a large range of people extremely quickly. This is exactly what the AfD is using to its advantage. Worse, its right-wing propaganda shifts public discourse ever more to the right – another goal of the AfD.
Tiktok has more than 20 million users per month in Germany – a vast reservoir for the AfD. Even better for the AfD, two thirds of 12-to-19-year-olds report using the app regularly. Increasingly, younger people are also looking for news and information on TikTok where the border between far-right propaganda and news is vanishing fast.
All of this is a very serious problem for example, for the upcoming European election in June. What is playing out well for the AfD is that young Germans will be allowed – for the first time – to vote from the age of 16.
With a reservoir of almost five million young people, German first-time voters are set to become particularly important. Worse, the neofascist AfD has been highly successful in reaching this age group with its right-wing extremist propaganda. This has already come to the fore in past elections.
And it is getting worse. According to current polls, the AfD is the strongest force in three states of the former East-Germany – Brandenburg, Saxony, and Thuringia.
It is not impossible that the lowering of the voting age threatens those who promoted it, namely, the social-democratic SPD and the environmentalist Greens. This, in turn, might encourage Germany’s democratic parties to beef up their game in competing for young voters.
They will be forced to understand that they need to look for new ways to communicate with young people. This might indeed mean through TikTok.
Indeed, since the beginning of 2024, the number of TikTok accounts by Germany’s three progressive parties – “the socialist “Die Linke”, the social-democrat “SPD”, and the environmentalist “Greens” – has grown.
Accounts of political parties and finally also of prominent politicians have been added to TikTok. Just in time for Germany’s cannabis legalization, even Health Minister Karl Lauterbach opened a Tiktok account.
Since April, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz can be accompanied in his daily political life under “@teambundeskanzler”, including his famous briefcase, which he has been carrying with him for years. Others, such as social-democrat politician Kevin Kühnert (SPD), recently reactivated an already existing account.
German progressives have even started a “#ReclaimTikTok” campaign – after a very long (perhaps “too long”) period of hesitation. Even the Greens are taking part. So far, the environmentalists have been betting mainly on Instagram. Germany’s conservative CDU has only recently followed.
Yet, there are also serious downsides to Politiktok. For one, the online platform does not follow democratic rules of engagement. Worse, it does not protect young people from discrimination and does not fight disinformation. Some argue that TikTok is not a suitable platform for the state and its elected officials.
Meanwhile, party apparatchik Phil Hackemann of Germany’s neo-liberal party – the FPD – also has a TikTok account. However, the 29-year-old does not want to attach too much importance to his account. Yet, the youth group (Julis) of the neoliberal FDP has opted against using TikTok.
Consequently, Hackemann himself does not appear on TikTok as a top candidate of the neoliberal youth organization. He argues, if the Julis take this position, I have to stick to it in the end and accept that.
Yet, the neoliberal youth organization “the Julis” is convinced that using Tiktok will enable them to reach young Germans. Moving to TikTok would not just be a pragmatic move but also a political move. Beyond that, there are still concerns about TikTok.
The app can be discriminatory against, for example, an “LGBTQ hashtags”. And, there are also security concerns. Some assume that the Chinese state apparatus at least potentially has access to ByteDance’s database.
Despite this, many do not want to leave the field of politics to right-wing populists without a fight. They argue that it remains important to reach young people. They want to share political content and they also want to try to break into previously “a-political” bubbles. Some even think about the streaming platform Twitch.
Beyond all that, one of the key questions for Germany’s democratic parties is about how can young people be protected from right-wing extremists, neofascist propaganda, accidental misinformation, and from deliberate disinformation?
Perhaps a good starting point is in the EU’s Digital Service Act which enforces a sufficient moderation of content. Others suggest restricting or even deleting accounts.
In 2021, for example, Tiktok deleted the AfD’s federal account. However, that didn’t do much good. The network is too large and there are too many accounts. Despite this, it remains unclear whether Germany’s democratic parties can catch up with the AfD’s lead in the use of online platforms.
On Politiktok, it is very easy for the AfD to communicate evil. Meanwhile, it is way more difficult for Germany’s governing parties to explain complex relationships. On the upswing, one might hope that Germany’s democratic parties will use “positive emotions” to fight right-wing populism.
Set against the efforts of Germany’s democratic parties and pushing right-wing extremist ideologies are TikTok’s algorithm that primarily promote pointed, short, sensationalized, and dramatized contents. This makes TikTok the perfect media for far-right populists like the AfD’s non-official Führer, Björn Höcke.
Worse, far-right AfD candidate and Putin-stooge Maximilian Krah generates 1.4 million views. His misogynistic right-wing statement is, “real men are on the right”.
Far worse, almost every speech made by the neofascist AfD in Germany’s parliament is specifically designed and formulated so that it can perfectly be used as a short video on TikTok. While Germany’s democratic parties believe that contributions of the AfD are inputs to a political debate, the AfD has only far-right propaganda in mind.
The AfD does this to reach its audience. And it targets a vast pool as almost every fourth person in Germany is on TikTok – a whopping 19.5 million. Among them are many young users who spend an average of more than 90 minutes a day on TikTok.
The neofascist AfD is astutely aware of this. With its populist videos, the AfD wants to convince young people of its anti-democratic ideology. Worse, its right-wing strategy is working out extremely well. With a market share of at least 70%, the AfD reaches significantly more people on Politiktok than all of Germany’s democratic parties combined.
To achieve this, the AfD uses numerous accounts and therefore continues to spread its hate messages rather undisturbed. What also works in the party’s favor is not just its algorithms but also the fact that TikTok are primarily interested in advertising revenue. Hence, the longer a user stay on the app, the more advertising clips can be played out to them.
The company benefits from a content that attracts a lot of attention – such as, for example, the sensational, inhuman, and populist content of the far-right AfD. In other words, algorithms, online platforms, advertising profits, the far-right, and capitalism work in unison.
In the long term, binding legal regulations against right-wing extremist incitement and hate speech on the internet are needed. Online platforms must no longer be able to shirk their responsibility. If TikTok is serious about fighting hate speech, it must block the neofascist accounts of the AfD
Born on the foothills of Castle Frankenstein, Thomas Klikauer (PhD) is the author of a book on “The AfD”.
